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Friday, September 9, 2011

Frankmusik Live at the Theater of the Living Arts, Sept 8th 2011

It's been just about 2 years since I last saw Frankmusik live-- the first time FM played as a last minute guest for the Perez Hilton tour and opened the show for 3 other artists. At that time, Complete Me, his first record, had only been out for a month or so. The performance was a stellar track by track type set, featuring some beat-boxing. Much has changed since that show. FM now lives in LA, and has his upcoming sophomore release Do It In The A.M.. So how did last night's performance compare to 2009's?

Last night's show was an odyssey of old and new music for Frankmusik. Given only a half hour set, he knows he needs to make it count, so he forewent the typical "chat between songs" for a short speech announcing who he was and his new record and went straight into his set. I won't spoil all of FM's set, but he played a live-mashup of some of his new tracks combined with covers of some modern dance tracks and a few hits from the 80s. At one point he was singing the vocal line and lyrics of a track off Do It In The A.M. over the hook from "Sweet Dreams" by the Eurythmics. Many of the songs were connected for longer jams as well. It was a bit like seeing a live DJ perform the tracks, and it was really something special. Another highlight for me was his duet of "No I.D." his newest single, with his backup singer and keyboardist Casey Carlson, who was a semi-finalist on "American Idol" a couple years back. When it was over, I was wishing it went on another hour. Yes, I missed some of his older tracks (only a couple were included from Complete Me), and I missed him playing the piano for at least a song or two, but it was a really awesome show to see.

The headliner of the show was Erasure, who I'm not quite as much of a fan of, but they still sounded great. It was a little disappointing that I was unable to see Vince Clarke's arms moving around and playing the keyboard, as he was hidden from view behind a giant gargoyle (I kid you not). Vince has been called "The Ben Franklin of Synthesizer Music" so it was pretty cool to witness the master on stage. Overall, for a band who's been playing since before I was born, they sounded pretty damn good.

After his set, FM hung out around the merch booth signing his new single and chatting with fans, and was, as always, a super nice guy. Hopefully there will be an interview (interview is here!) up with him sooner than later. Be sure to catch the rest of the Erasure "Tomorrow's World" Tour featuring Frankmusik and check out Frankmusik's new record coming out September 27th-- preorder it on iTunes!